[Wōdnes-dæg] Advocating for a Better Kind of Fry

A food as rich and thorough as avocado needs no preparation. But everything's better fried, isn't it? So avocado fries must, by default, be indescribably delicious.

I got the basic recipe for avocado fries from an article that ran in the Feb. 21 issue of the Globe and Mail.

To carry out this procedure you'll need:

• one almost ripe avocado
  
• two cups cooking oil (any will do, but a high smokepoint is ideal)
  
• one egg
  
• bread crumbs
  
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• one small pot
  
• two bowls
  

The Globe and Mail's recipe calls for cumin and panko crumbs, but since I have neither I cut the former out entirely and just used regular breadcrumbs. My fries had less of a kick and less of a big crunch, but the small breadcrumb-covered crescents reminded me of fried shrimp in look and tempura yams in texture.

To kick this recipe off, cut your avocado in half. If you're unfamiliar with how to do this, then follow along.

Pop out the remainder of the stem in the top of your avocado, then cut your fruit in half length-wise. Take the avocado in your hand and twist the two separated halves apart - one half will have held onto the pit. Slide the blade of your knife into the pit (one slow cut along its middle, then gently rock the blade deeper into the pit) and turn the knife to the left or right to remove the pit.

Once you have your avocado in half use your knife to cut the fruit into 1/2 inch strips (length or width wise). Use a spoon to work out the pieces, or just to loosen them in the husk. Gently squeezing top to bottom can also help loosen your avocado slices.

Next, break your egg into a bowl and scramble it with a fork or egg beater. Add about a 3/4 cup of breadcrumbs to your other bowl and add salt and pepper to these crumbs to taste.

Toss your avocado pieces through the egg bath so that each one is liberally covered. Then, using your fork, move each piece from the egg bath to the bread crumbs and cover each avocado piece with the breadcrumb mixture.

At this point, put your cooking oil into a small pot and put it on a burner set to medium-high (or 7-8 of 10). Let the oil heat up for a minute or two - to test if the oil is hot enough to fry the egg and breadcrumbs on your avocado pieces toss a piece of bread into the oil. Once the bread quickly turns brown after touching the oil, it's hot enough to cook up your avocado fries.

Set all of your avocado slices into the oil, and keep a careful watch over them to make sure that they don't burn. Because all you're doing by frying them is softening the avocado and making the egg and breadcrumb coating crisp, each piece will take one minute (two, tops) to fry - if they are all fully immersed.

Place your avocado fries onto a paper towel (or a double layer of tissues, in a pinch) to drain off the oil and then enjoy!

They'll turn out looking like this:

{Definitely toasty - and also soft centered.}

And that's all there is to avocado fries.

My only warning is that you should be careful about how ripe of an avocado you use. If you use one that's soft enough to turn to guacamole in your hands, then you'll likely end up with more of a mess than a masterpiece; but if you use an avocado that is still as hard as a fossilized dinosaur egg, then your crumbs and egg will probably burn before your avocado even starts to soften. Ideally, the avocado you use for this recipe should still be firm to the touch, with just a little bit of give under pressure.

If you try this recipe and want to go on about how simple and delicious it is, or want to call me out for creating a fried abomination, feel free to do so in the comments.

And on Friday check back for my attempt to find some good in The Seeker: The Dark is Rising.

[Moon-dæg] Why Shouldn't the Twain Meet?

{Ontario's Premier Dalton McGuinty is also thinking about teachers college - doubling its length. Photo credited to Wikipedia.com.}

Teachers college. Should I go, or should I just duck out of it and take another route to get into teaching?

Today's entry is the second installment in my four part series all about that question.

Specifically, now that I've had a week to mull over the facts and the figures, it's time to take a more logical look at them, and at one of the options for my future.

Starting with the financial aspect of things, teachers college is a pretty sweet proposition. In the long term.

That's not a bad term for something to be good in, but it seems that all of the honey of this decision can only be enjoyed after I've endured the stings of the swarming bees of time.

As a person who would get certified to teach English and/or History at the Middle/High School level, I'd not be in great demand. And because I'd be one of the many extras bopping around in the teaching market in Ontario, I might not get something solid and sturdy until five years after graduation, until 2018. Until then I'd have to supply teach, work part time, or do something unrelated to pay back whatever loans I took out, or whatever my current cost of living would be.

Talk about an exercise in self-denial.

Nonetheless, once employed, if I could live on half of my salary ($40,000-$55,000) and spend the rest to pay off my debts, they'd be gone in 2-4 years. Of course, not knowing clearly just how much I'd need to borrow (banking mostly on awards, bursaries, and such might not be stable, but that's what paid for my MA) makes guessing how long I'll be indebted difficult, but I think that 2-4 years is still accurate.

The worst case scenario, then, would be that I'd be starting work in 2018, and be debt free in 2022 - a solid ten years from now. After that - despite having gotten married at some point within those ten years, and probably having had a kid - my salary (increases and all) would be nothing but gravy - matters of mortgage, any other loan repayment, and/or raising a child aside.

So financially, this is certainly a stable option. Wife, 2.5 kids, small dog, house in the suburbs type stuff.

Socially this is also a fair deal since my social life would change, but also remain similar.

I'd be likely to move out of South-Western Ontario, but I'd still be within the province, so get-togethers would continue to be doable, even if they were treks. And I'd be exposed to new environments and new people, so things would be energized in that way, even if I stuck with South Western Ontario. Not to mention, there'd also be my cohort from my teachers college program. New bonds formed, new learning had, and new ideas (hopefully) encountered.

This all sounds great.

This all sounds like Teaching ESL - though much more formalized. At least in the sense that I'd need to go to a school for a full year, and then I'd be able to stay in province (or country) and work.

As per my personal life, going to teachers college would delay wedding my fiancée for a year or two. At the same time, it could see me stepping out into the world once more, and not boomeranging back as I did before.

But with a wait time of up to five years, and part time/supply/unrelated work being what can be done while I wait for a full time teaching job, I also need to face up to the fact that it's possible that I would boomerang back. And Small Town Ontario cannot be mistaken for a city.

Even Twin Peaks, as long as it is a typo on the town's sign so that it should read 5,120, is smaller than my Small Town in Ontario.

And living in a place where the only way to go to other towns is by car, and you lack a car (though not a license) doesn't make it easy to co-ordinate interview times outside of a one hour radius. This limitation is problematic, since I'm aiming to settle in a place like Guelph or KW.

However, amidst all of these considerations and all of these different possibilities, I am forgetting one major thing.

After I have finished my stint at teachers college, I could go and teach overseas. That experience could fill in the five-year gap that stands between most new teachers college grads and full-time employment, could see me get some hands-on time teaching, could see me continue to encounter new people, places, and things, and it could see me make the money needed to pay back whatever loans I'd taken out in the process of going through teachers college.

Honestly, that could work. I could go to teachers college. Take on whatever debt I had to take on, then go off to Asia the next year. I could probably get myself debt free in three years or less, and I'd be able to start that in earnest right after graduation. So I could be completely free of most financial worry by 2016, only four years from now.

Getting married somewhere in between teachers college and going overseas would also work, since paying back that debt would merely increase my and my fiancée's stay overseas. Hardly a high price to pay.

Yet. Being across the ocean would make it even more difficult to interview for teaching jobs in Ontario (at least if they insist on in-person interviews) than moving back to my home town.

Nonetheless, going to teachers college could work as a combined opportunity. The extra teacher training would give me an advantage and earnings increase were I to teach overseas, and I'd be able to hit the ground running as soon as I'd graduated.

This all sounds like a solid proposition to me. As if it could form the basis of a solid career - something that I can do in the light of day while at night I continue with the writing of such things as this blog.

However, the question of teachers college isn't resolved just yet. Check back next week to see my less logical, more streamlined response to the points that I've laid out here and to the facts that I dredged up last week.

In the meantime, Wednesday's entry will be the last of the food-related Wodnes-dæg entries for a while (avocado fries, anyone?), and on Friday I'll post my attempt to redeem the movie The Seeker: The Dark is Rising.

Do you have any thoughts on writing while holding down a day job? Let me know in a comment below.

[Freya-dæg] A Movie That's Been Unnecessarily Burked

It seems that there's something that I should have considered in last week's review of The Love Guru. Watching such a bad movie will make any movie watched immediately (perhaps up to a week) afterwards seem amazing. At least, that's the feeling that I'm left with after reading reviews of Burke and Hare - which got a 34% from critics and a 37% from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes.

However, I seriously disagree with these numbers.

But what am I disagreeing with? What are so many peoples' beefs with this movie?

The biggest beef, I think, is the movie's being labelled a "dark comedy."

Yes, there are laughs. Yes, there are murders and messy 19th century dissections. But these two elements of "dark comedy" aren't pushed as much as you might expect from a movie labelled as such.

There are some good laughs and witty lines (maybe these seem even more so after watching The Love Guru), and there are some gory and grim scenes too. Yet nothing caused the laughs that Shaun of the Dead brought out, or the sort of atmosphere of fear that a story of 19th century murderers (the movie is based on the real case of Burke and Hare) often does.

Aside from the movie's mis-labelling, the story itself also seems to have been softened. Of Burke and Hare, Hare (Andy Serkis) is the schemer and the plotter, while Burke (Simon Pegg) is played more naively. Hardly do they seem like hard-boiled murderers for money/medical science.

One specific plot point stands out as falling flat.

It happens in the scene where Edinburgh's crime boss, Ferguson, takes Hare aside for the second time. Ferguson asks Hare to be his partner, and says that he has a choice to accept or decline, despite the situation suggesting that to decline would mean death.

My feeling is that Hare wouldn't be killed if he refused (as he and Burke were earlier in the movie), but it isn't that he'd be tossed from the carriage either. Further, if the fact that Hare's hesitation and the lack of a definite answer is supposed to humanize Hare, then the scene seems even more out of place.

Moreover, the movie plays the scene as a major point in the plot - but to me there's no real conflict present in it. Hare is the amoral one of the pair, and so of course he's going to accept, or, if he refuses, be able to slip through the hands of death.

More generally, there's too much going on in the movie plot-wise.

Three plot lines (Burke and Hare trying to make a buck, Ginny (played by Isla Fisher) trying to put on an all female Macbeth, and Drs. Knox and Munroe competing for glory) are definitely not too many, but one of these shouldn't have as much screen time as it does if the movie is supposed to be dark. Yes, alas, I'm looking at you all-ladies-Macbeth, or, rather, the Ginny-Burke romantic subplot.

However, this romantic subplot is engaging and enthralling. It's definitely nothing new in the world of cinema romance, but partly because Simon Pegg is playing the naive sidekick rather than the serious ideas man (as he had in Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz), partly because it involves Shakespeare, and partly because Isla Fisher effectively convinced me that she wanted to put on the Scottish play, it works.

Actually, both Fisher and Jessica Hynes (playing Lucky, Hare's wife) are excellent matches for their male counterparts and show that they've got serious chops on their own, too.

But it is really the relationships between Burke and Ginny and Hare and Lucky that fire up the movie. As with the romantic subplot, these relationships don't break new ground or anything, but they really give an extra punch to the movie.

In particular, Burke and Ginny's relationship is so engaging that when Burke suggests that she goes to London and says that she doesn't need her anymore I found myself preemptively mouthing her reply. Yes, it was that predictable, but their relationship is also so engaging that I found myself mouthing lines.

And bolstering the strength of the main players in the flick, are a number of cameos and other fine stars (Tim Curry, Bill Bailey, and the inimitable Christopher Lee). These might just be little one offs or brief scenes, but the appearance of these actors is amazing. In a similar vein, references to and cameos of famous Romantic Poets are presented as well. I think I know why this movie only made $4,833 ($945 opening weekend) at the US Box Office.

Some solid bits of dialogue are also on offer.

Among these exchanges are incisive and revelatory bits of 19th century Scotland (Hare (on the cost of living in Edinburgh): "I thought life out here was supposed to be cheap" McTavish: "It is.") and those that are at the level of a highbrow Love Guru (Dr Munroe (of Dr. Knox's new students): "Are they enjoying your lectures?" Dr. Knox: "Not as much as they're enjoying your wife"). In either case, Mordecai and Rigby of Regular Show fame aptly capture my reaction to such wit:

{Found on Tumblr, uploaded by cferrr.}

The historical details that are included in the film are excellent as well - from fashion to architecture and design. Most notable of all such references being the offer of "chocolate" to the captain of the militia when he's meeting Lord Harrington. But they don't mean a piece or a chunk - oh no.

They mean hot chocolate, a drink made of cacao mixed with various spices. A drink that was a high style contender in the UK until coffee shops proliferated in the middle of the 18th century. My guess as to why hot chocolate's still around the chambers of power in 1828 Edinburgh: they knew a good thing when they had it and were slow to make the change.

Before I can securely pass judgment on Burke and Hare, I need to address head on one last issue: Ginny's all female Macbeth production.

Critics are perfectly right to ask why it's included. However, I believe that I have an answer.

It's kind of a contrived means of doing so, but I think that the Macbeth rigmarole is included as a reflection of Burke and Hare's consciences. Quite a bit like the play within a play in Hamlet. In answer to the question of "why Ginny?" my theory is that it's the writers' way of showing that she's a strong female character, as well as giving the romantic subplot more detail. Perhaps it's an overly elaborate way of accomplishing these ends, but it's the way the writers went with.

Ultimately, it's safe to say that I disagree entirely with the overall ratings from both the critics and the audience as they appear on Rotten Tomatoes.

Burke and Hare is a film featuring great actors, great characters, awesome literary and historical references, and a few chuckles here and there. In fact, this movie illustrates my general taste in movies: hammy drama and comedy that balance the subtle and the slapstick.

Burke and Hare might not be acted as hammily as some of the old Hammer movies that it refers to, but the comedy is a refreshing blend. The Love Guru may be *ahem* thanked for that, but I am also confident that this movie stands on its own merits as well. After all it's this English major's dream come true to see a 19th century movie that isn't set in London.

And screen-cap Tim Curry also approves.

So, Freya, fly low that you may bear this one up as though it were on eagle's wings.

Check back after the weekend for the waxing moon installment of my musings on teacher's college, and if you've got your own thoughts on Burke and Hare that you want to share, leave me a comment.

[Wōdnes-dæg] Purely Stovetop Popped

Before there were movie theatres and microwaves, people popped corn kernels in pots.

These kernels were stripped from cobs, tossed into metal pots and then those pots were placed over heat. A little bit of oil would be added to keep the kernels from sticking to each other and the pot as they popped, and maybe even for some added flavour.

Because these basic elements still exist today, making popcorn from scratch remains an easy task. So grab yourself a pot, some cooking oil, and popcorn kernels - 'cause here we go.

Because popping corn itself is just kernels of corn (maize), it will be quite bland if you stove-top pop it with a light oil like canola or vegetable. This also means, however, that popcorn is practically a blank canvas on which most any flavour can be splashed. Along with the traditional olive, canola, vegetable, sunflower, etc. oils, stove-top popping is also a great way to used recycled cooking oil.

Such recycled cooking oil can come from the excess oil left after cooking meals or from rendering animal skin or fat to make scrunchions - all that sweet sweet oil that's left after such bits are fried up will have a rich, quasi-salty flavour. Feel free to experiment with different oils.

One you've decided on your oil of choice, you just add it to the pot after your kernels are in.

Now, a good rule of thumb is to cover the bottom of your pot with a layer of kernels that is one-kernel deep. Your oil should cover over the kernels almost entirely. After adding these two things, pop your pot onto the stove-top burner and set the burner to it's second highest setting.

While it's cooking, your popcorn needs almost no attention. Keep an ear open for when the popping starts and for when it trails off, but otherwise leave it alone.

Once the popping slows to one every four seconds or so, pull your pot off the heat, and let it cool. If your pot is bursting with popped kernels, then loosen the lid, but leave it on. Otherwise, take the lid off of your pot. You can also shake the pot slightly to knock free kernels that might have gotten stuck to the pot's sides.

And that's it. If you want popcorn with a bit more flavour (and you've used a relatively light oil), then you can toss salt over your popped kernels, or you can add salt into the oil before you cook it. A teaspoon of salt will do for a cup of un-popped kernels.


Kernels cooked in regular oil, before and after:

If you want to add a little bit of challenge to your popcorn making experience, however, you can try your hand at making sweet popcorn. Carnival Caramelized Kernels. Korean Sweety Corn. Tijuana Teeth Stickers.

1920s-style euphemisms aside, making sweet popcorn is all a matter of timing and attention.

Instead of adding salt or nothing to the oil before you pop your corn, toss some sugar into the pot. How much sugar depends on how sweet you want your corn, and how obvious you want the caramel coating on your kernels to be.

For about 1/4 cup of kernels I use a teaspoon of sugar. White, brown, turbinado - any kind will work. You can also try things like honey or maple syrup, but doing so can make things messier than necessary. Cooking honey and syrup tends to mellow their sweetness and as a result you'll likely need to use more of these, which in turn increases the attention you need to pay to your popping corn.

After all, adding sugar (or anything sweet) to the mix means that as the oil heats and your kernels prepare to pop, that sweet stuff is going to cook as well. Cook so much that it's likely to burn if left alone. To avoid the creation of a terrible charred mess on the bottom of your pot, you need to stand over your popcorn, watch it, and periodically shake it back and forth while keeping it over the heat. Just think "Jiffy Pop."

Kernels cooked in oil and sugar, before and after:

As February comes to a close, so too will my focus on recipes that I'm currently learning about, practicing, and perfecting. In it's place, I'll be updating with what I'm learning about thanks to my Google alerts or daily newspaper. I'll find something of great interest, look up 3-5 other sources on the same topic/issue, and then toss all my sources' information together to make up one of these entries. But before the change, there will be one more food-centric entry.

If you've got something that you want me to write about (to preempt my Google alerts/daily newspaper), or want me to switch back to my Wōdnes-dæg entries' cooking theme, tell me about it in a comment. And check back here Friday for my take on Burke and Hare.

[Moon-dæg] New Moon, New Stats: The Teacher's College Route

It seems that now is not a good time to be looking into teaching English or History - traditionally over-supplied subjects - in high schools in Ontario.

For the past five years, if the Maclean's and National Post articles on the subject are any guide, teachers in general have had a hard time finding work. This is less true of those teaching technology, sciences, or French, but I am none of those and so there's no need for me to go too far down that road.

The Transition to Teaching 2010 report also paints a bleak picture.

To sum up the report, new teachers across the board were optimistic about their next five years, but largely un- or under- employed.

26% of those new teachers surveyed for this report stated that they had full time contracts, while in 2009 that number was 31%. Piecework is where the teaching jobs seem to be, with about 42.5% working part time, about 39% working with multiple schools, and about 37% working as on-call supply teachers. About 17.5% of new teachers in 2010 were working in non-teaching jobs to pay the bills.

Amidst the Intermediate-Senior certificate holders (my potential peers), 30% are unemployed (or just not working as teachers, I'm guessing), 48% are underemployed (they need to work a non-teaching job to supplement their teaching income), 20% are teaching daily supply, and 30% have regular jobs. Thankfully, I'm not trying or planning to get into teaching math and stats, because I know that those numbers add to something greater than 100 - but that's just how many teachers are out there, I guess.

So, using the Toronto District School Board's collective agreement with the Ontario College of Teachers as a standard for urban earnings, I could expect to make $45,709 a year as a teacher starting out with little or no experience.

That's for full time work.

Part time work is something that I could consider, and realistically I should look into it, but it's not really something that I think I'll be doing. That's also for work in Toronto. The Big Smoke. Ol' TO. But what would I be making in the country? or in the northern reaches of Ontario?

Barrie/Guelph/K-W aren't exactly the rural areas of Ontario, but they aren't Toronto either. In these areas my salary could range from $29,747.20 to $56,320. My calculations are based on this table, a 40 hour work week, and 32 weeks of work per year.

Going further away from TO, I think that it's fair to guess that starting salary for a high school English/History teacher would hover around $45-50,000. But does Northern Ontario, as represented by North Bay and Thunder Bay, hold the standard of living I've come to expect?

Both cities have at least five bookstores that stock used books (though North Bay, surprisingly, seems to have more). They both have a Bulk Barn - essential for cheap groceries). And they both have movie theatres (though North Bay has a non-chain venue with 6$ tickets and a slick site). But Thunder Bay has 16 regular city bus routes while North Bay has only 11.

Blame it on my fascination with Twin Peaks (despite the differences between the NW US and Northern Ontario), but Northern Ontario holds a strange romance to me. Yet, Victoria (and BC itself) also held that - and still does - though living there for 2 years certainly tempered that romance with the province's cold, grey reality.

Working with the Transition to Teaching's 2010 report, it looks like I've got a 3 in 10 chance of landing something full-time right out of teacher's college. Odds that are not particularly strong, but that would improve, slowly but surely (perhaps, optimistically, at 5% a year) over the course of the five years that my internet searching and chatting up friends and relatives who are recent graduates or currently teachers leads me to expect as a wait time between graduation and full time employment.

But all of this becomes most relevant after I've finished teacher's college. What's a standard one year program going to cost?

At the schools that I've applied to, tuition runs the gamut of $6-8,000 for full tuition. Add $1000 for textbooks. Living costs per month sit around $1,500 (based on the fact that most apartments do not have utilities included in their rent). So then, for the full teacher's college experience I would be spending about $27,000. A tidy sum, and one that could see me getting a loan or two.

And now, for the next week, I'll mull over just what these numbers actually mean to me. So check back then for my logical analysis of going to teacher's college. In the meantime, Wednesday's entry will be about pot-popped popcorn and this Friday I'll try to find some good in a film that made a whopping $947 at the US box office: Burke and Hare.

Do you have any stats on teacher's college and/or teaching that I've missed? If so, drop them in the comments.

[Freya-dæg] When Love Hurts

Mike Myers' movies aren't necessarily the most high concept films around. Nor are they always the most original. But it's definitely a low mark when one of his movies takes gross-out comedy so far that it becomes hard to watch. The Love Guru is just such a Myers' movie.

It's only an hour and a half long but, because of all of the gross-out comedy, it's difficult to get involved with the story, characters, or dialog.

In fact, it felt like a three hour flick rather than the quick 90 minute fluff that Myers' generally produces. What's worse though, is that the story itself is so clearly defined and straightforward that it should be more difficult to throw the movie from its track.

The movie follows Guru Pitka (Mike Myers) who comes over from India to help a star player on the Toronto Maple Leafs (Darren Roanoke, played by Romany Malco). Setting the movie in Toronto is one of a few nods in the flick to Myers' Canadian origins, one of the few things in the film that work. At any rate, Pitka helps the player out so that he can get a spot on Oprah and become "the next Deepak Chopra."

The plot is made even simpler by its being given a Stanley Cup playoff time-frame, which at the least assures viewers that the movie has a definite end.

Characters like Guru Pitka and his master (played by Ben Kingsley) are indeed characters, and they embellish this otherwise plain story. But their embellishment is in shades of brown rather than shades of grey.

The rest of the cast is relatively lackluster. There are some exceptions, but I need an ace in the hole to give this one a chance at redemption, so I'll return to that later.

The core issues with this movie are that it constantly resorts to graphic, low brow humour that at points is truly gag-worthy (a fight using mops soaked in urine, for example) and an overall lack of subtlety.

Of course, these two things are generally staples of Mike Myers' movies. The exception with The Love Guru is that for some reason they're both served up in such grandiose proportions that it's difficult to figure out why or to get past them to the simple, lightly feel-good story.

But so little time spent on the bad, must mean that there are a lot of redeeming qualities here, right? Well, in a way.

I can name all of the good things about this movie off in a single list, actually: Stephen Colbert, Justin Timberlake, John Oliver, and Ben Kingsley. Yeah. That's right, Ben Kingsley. I'm not incredibly familiar with his career, and appearing here as Pitka's master may have been a move to play off type, but still. I was flummoxed when I saw him in this film. Flummoxed.

Now, of these four exceptional actors, Kingsley, Colbert (as Jay Kell), and Timberlake (as Jacques Grande) all played their parts exceedingly well. It's clear that despite the terribleness of the film otherwise, they were having fun doing it. But John Oliver (as Dick Pants) seemed to be phoning it in.

In all of his scenes I got the impression that Oliver just didn't want to be there. In fact, it seemed as though he'd gotten a call from Mike Meyers about a movie, got so excited that he didn't read the script and accepted without any hesitation only to realize what he had inextricably gotten himself into well after it was too late to back out.

That said, these four actors really do make the movie glow when they're on screen, even if those glows may be brief or very well-basted in silliness.

Actually, those four actors might also be what's wrong with this movie. They wouldn't have come cheap, and neither would the movie's special effects. These effects are concentrated in a scene where Mike Myers' head is smoothly CGI-ed onto a child's body and another where a third eye opens up on Darren's forehead in a very organic and nicely done way.

Not to mention, they must've spent a fair bit buying cover licenses for the three pop songs performed on sitar (though all of these are are definite highlights).

A lack of money in the film's account by the end, or maybe even before filming really hit its stride is clear in camerawork that makes some scenes look almost handy-cam quality. Editing must have also taken a hit since there a few jerky cuts between scenes that are no doubt where the deleted bits are included in the "uncut" version.

In spite of all this, there were a few laughs here and there. The words of Guru Hathasmalvena cracked me up as only syphilitic ramblings can. And some of the guru's book titles were ridiculous self-help parodies, but by the movie's half-way point all of the funny jokes run their course.

Though the line "keep the elephant running," might just stick with me for a while.

But context- or subtext-reliant lines and jokes are as sparse in this film as all-beef burger stands in New Delhi.

Surprisingly however, the romance aspect of the film involving Darren Roanoke and his estranged wife Prudence (Meagan Good) is played well and produces a surprisingly tender moment. Of course, this is buried under the rest of the film's scatological and penis jokes.

Colbert, Timberlake, Kingsley, Oliver, a joke voice-over by Morgan Freeman, and a cameo appearance by Daniel Tosh are all well and good, but these talents are better showcased in other things (like Oliver in The Bugle, for instance). Waiting through the movie to spot these actors, and the few effective moments would be tiresome rather than entertaining.

Critics on Rotten Tomatoes panned it (15%), audiences weren't much pleased (38%), and Harry Knowles (of Ain't it Cool News) even said that this movie is a career killer for Myers. And, I just can't find enough to really bring it back.

The Love Guru's got an amazing cast in many respects, a handful of actually tender or funny moments, some pretty impressive effects, and cool sitar pop song covers, but they're all bound together with a script that cripples the lot and a story that is just a vehicle for scatological jokes and bawdy puns.

Freya, leave this one where it lay - and, if you touched it, you should definitely wash your hands.

[Wōdnes-dæg] Breakin' Eggs Over Bibimbap

Maybe there's only so much that can be done with the combination of rice, vegetables, and meat. Maybe sushi, congee (or jook), and fried rice are variations enough on uses for the staple grain. But Korea has a dish that all it's own and that is unbelievably simple.

It's called bibimbap (literally, "mixed rice"). It's something that I learned of while in Korea, and that I'm now trying to re-learn, as it were. This dish involves an array of vegetables laid around a fried (or, in some cases raw, hence the title) egg with the meat of choice or convenience placed on top. Sesame seed oil and ssamjang (hot pepper paste) are are also necessary, but don't necessarily get seen.

My recent experiment with this dish proved successful, but the lack of a good ssamjang substitute made from Western ingredients left the whole tasting a little bit bland. Though the lack of punch and pleasant umami-ness (from the usual strips of seaweed) were made up for by my use of an avocado.

But onto my other ingredients already.

I made a relatively small bowl of Dainty brand Gem long grain rice, steamed in the same way that it is when I make sushi, julienned carrot, sliced romaine lettuce, an avocado, butter fried crimini mushrooms, sardines, and of course a single fried egg (sunny-side up). These vegetables aren't generally used in bibimbap except for the carrots and usually the mushrooms, but limited ingredients forced me to improvise.

Along with the more traditional carrots and mushrooms, bibimbap found in a Korean restaurant will likely have seaweed, bracken fern stems, spinach, sprouts, cucumber, zucchini, and or daikon. Sardines are also an unusual pick since the canned fish that might be used is tuna, though chicken and beef are more common.

The construction of the dish is pretty straight forward. Steam the rice, put it in a bowl, drop your ssamjang onto the rice's middle, add your vegetables around the middle, then put down the egg, the meat, and the sesame seed oil.

However, it is important that the yolk of your egg is soft (but not broken!) so that the yolk can freely mix in with the other ingredients. This is where breaking an egg over the bibimbap and then using the rice's heat to cook it would be most practical, but this works best if you also cook all of the vegetables. Cooking mushrooms and bracken fern stems is definitely necessary, but carrots and avocados, not so much. Ditto with seaweed.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the bulk of the flavour of your bibimbap is going to come from the ssamjang and sesame seed oil.

If you use too much of either, or of both, you'll not only make the dish super nutty and super spicy, but you won't be able to taste any of the vegetables - maybe not even the meat. Rather than the symphony that bibimbap can be you'll wind up with a solo or duet played awkwardly over a dampened, full band accompaniment. My rule of thumb is one tbsp of sesame seed oil per serving of bibimbap, and 1 1/2 to two tbsp of ssamjang.

If you happen to be short on sesame seed oil you can just mash toasted sesame seeds in cooking oil. Vegetable/canola oil works best for a straight-up sesame seed taste, while olive oil adds complexity to this taste.

If you're short on ssamjang, however, the exact spice is difficult to quickly approximate. Ssamjang itself is a fermented bean paste mixed with red peppers (think chilis) and garlic. It also comes in two varieties, heavy garlic:

Or heavy spice:

As a substitute I mixed some horseradish with chili powder and paprika. The spice isn't exactly the same, but this mixture still brings the bite. As per proportions, a mix of one tbsp horseradish to 1/4 tsp chili pepper and paprika worked well. This mix didn't give quite enough spice over all, though, so the next time I make this dish, I'll definitely make a double batch.

Nonetheless, this is the edible essay created from my tasty research (before it was all mixed together):

If you've got a suggestion for homemade ssamjang, for something you want me to try to cook, or for a topic I should research for one of these entries related to Wōden, then let me know about it by leaving a comment.

[Moon-dæg] Like Red Pepper Paste to Rice: Returning to Overseas ESL Teaching (Moon-dæg)

As the moon once more fades into the end of its cycle and stands in the sky as a giant "C" for "crone," my focus on the topic of this lunar month begins to wane. This means a wrapping up of my working through the pros and cons of going overseas to teach ESL and the introduction of the next cycle's topic: going to teacher's college.

Bearing in mind the facts that I dredged up, my first lines of reasoning, and my relatively free form musing, I can decisively say that going abroad to teach ESL is definitely a serious option for me.

I've got past experience that I can refer to, it'd be a great experience for my fiancée and I, and it'd give us some actual earning power in a place where enjoyable jobs aren't so difficult to come by.

Yes, it would also put a substantial distance between us and friends and family, but that's what being young is all about. And on a grander scale, it's also a reflection of the fact that you can't actually be everything to everyone, nor can you (or should you) live according to another person's wishes. After all, once that person leaves your life, then you're stuck with a life that's not your own and that lacks its old anchor.

So, if we suddenly had the money to marry and were considering what we'd do next, teaching overseas is definitely the first thing that would come to mind. Unlike teacher's college, it's something that we'd be able to do together (adding to my remaining hesitance, however, is that she's not keen on training to be a teacher in spite of the ESL job being a teaching one), and from which we could honeymoon somewhere crazy.

All that holds us back is that marriage thing - neither of our parents would be particularly pleased or still be on speaking terms with us if we just took two friends and went to the nearest justice of the peace. But a modest affair should come in at a smaller price than that quoted by the Ontario Wedding Blog.

Actually, that there's such a cost to going overseas entwines the options of ESL teaching and teacher's college for me.

Both of these experiences would cost roughly $20,000, one way or another. Teaching ESL at least would only cost me roughly $10,000, but so too could the cost of teacher's college be split by semester.

The problem with going to teacher's college is that, given demand for English teachers, I probably wouldn't be making any money from it for a few years. And so a loan would only lead to debt. Having avoided that so far, I'd prefer to keep it that way. Especially since once creditors find out that I'm trying to also live by writing they'd probably break my wrists before my legs. And I need these wrists...for things.

Going back would be for longer stretch of time than just a year, however.

If I go back I plan to be there for as long it takes to either secure enough money and make enough of a name for myself to live off of my writing full time back in Canada, or long enough to become so established in Korea as to not be able to leave. The second possibility sounds dismal, or somehow shadowy, but I'd at least be able to opt out after two years if it turns out that post-secondary ESL teaching isn't for me.

Honestly though, thoughts of teacher's college at this point make me seriously consider just going and getting hands-on experience overseas. Teaching high school is something to get by on, but teaching at a Canadian college would be better. And post-secondary teaching experience from abroad would be comparable or better training than a certification program specializing in teaching high school.

Nevertheless, there's a risk involved in both.

In going to teacher's college I would definitely need to take out a loan with my current income projection, and that loan would not get paid back immediately. There's also the risk that even with proper training and certification I'm left hunting for a job again. Trying to do so in Small Town Ontario to save on living expenses wouldn't put me at much of an advantage, either.

Going overseas would also require a loan (that marriage needs to happen first), but this loan would get repaid much more quickly. So there's very little financial risk in going overseas. Direct financial risk, at least.

After all, we could land in sub-standard overseas jobs. Nothing terrible, it *is* South Korea, after all, but not getting paid on time, or working serious, uncompensated overtime, or having materials constantly change at the last minute would all be terrible for multiple reasons. The risk of working at such a school is certainly lessened by going with a public school instead of a hagwon, but even then there's a chance that we'd end up in different institutions or with strangely suspicious administrators or both.

Given my fiancée's reluctance to take the teaching path at home there's also a chance that she'd not enjoy the work, meaning that she'd be more interested in staying for a year (unless she could do something other than teach) rather than for two or more.

Nonetheless, the risk of overseas teaching seems much smaller. Even if this size is an illusion created by the promise of a relatively substantial income.

We'd be employed. We'd be able to quickly cover any debt that we created by going over. We'd actually be together while we got a taste of the wider world and some hard and fast experience that could be used back in Canada if/when we came back.

Teacher's college would very likely mean more time apart while I study and then look for a placement while she continues on with things as they've been. It would mean that neither of us would really be making anything more than we are right now. It would mean, really, that the only secure, sure, positive, progressive thing that we'd have is closeness to friends and family.

That's definitely valuable, but hardly the sort of thing that can directly help a young couple move out of their parents' houses and establish themselves once and for all in the world. Sure, maybe one of our friends wins the lottery and decides to share the winnings because we're still in province. But, given my past experience, I'm comfortable saying that we'd probably have the same chance of winding up in questionable teaching jobs in South Korea.

So, though for the next four weeks I'll be laying down the facts and weighing the pros and cons of going to teacher's college, it seems that overseas ESL teaching is the way to go.

But, perhaps my mind, like the moon, will change yet again.

If you've got any comments, drop them in the box.

[Freya-dæg] Jonah Hex

Good comic book movies are hard to come by these days. Most are excellent showcases for fabulous special effects, and maybe for some comic-style art interludes that remind viewers that they're watching something based on a comic book. However, given Legendary Pictures' style of shooting these movies,m such sequences are hardly necessary.

But this isn't about Legendary Pictures. This is about just one of their comic book movies. One from two years ago called Jonah Hex. No, it's not recent. But, with Rotten Tomatoes as my witness, it sure is reviled. A critic score of 12% and audience score of 23% makes cringing faces and insistent thumbs down obvious to me.

And why did the movie fare so badly with audiences and critics? Well, as the consensus rating on RT suggests it is a relatively short movie, coming in at about 80 minutes. Even in 2010 most movies were at least 90. Were scenes that got cut so bad that they couldn't have included them to at least pad it out a bit? Maybe actually explain a thing or two? But length is the least of the movie's problems.

The biggest issue that I have with the movie is that it's not even trying to root itself in the 19th century wild west. There's a sci-fi "nation killer" weapon that the villain is after that, though different in substance, reminds me of the wacky sci-fi elements in Will Smith's Wild Wild West. At one point early on, in fact, a small town sheriff is dealing with Hex and he utters the words "aw hell..." I seriously thought he was going to follow up with "naw," but instead he went with "Hex." His loss, the reference would have made it clear that the rest of the movie is as ridiculous as Will Smith's wild west outing.

But anachronism doesn't end with sci-fi elements that lack proper explanation. It extends into the very fabric of the plot itself in that the villain, Quentin Turnbull (played by John Malkovich in much the same way he plays all his comic book villains), is said to be a "terrorista" by his "Mexican slaves." Add to the confederate soldiers that hold up a train by strapping dynamite across their chests. Instead of a film about the West being wild, it's just a movie about the fear of an internal terrorist attack based entirely on the return of an old enemy to the US of A - the South.

Again. I could let this go and maybe even enjoy the movie if things were better explained. Does Turnbull want to bring back slavery? Keep power in the South? Let all the states govern themselves separately? Just avoid being pushed around by "big government"? Aside from the fact that the South lost the Civil War, no motivation is given for his actions. A villain without motivation is like an allegory told without symbolism or metaphor. Oops.

One more big problem and then I'll move onto a few of the smaller ones.

The overall message of the movie, if it can be said to have one, is that vengeance only begets more vengeance and killing and war are bad. At least, that's what the voice overs in the first few scenes suggest. But Jonah never tries to solve things peacefully. Many of the movie's scenes end in explosions, and Jonah demonstrates his prowess with a pistol by never leaving any prisoners.

Hell, in the scene where he's bartering with the sheriff about the four brothers he just brought in, he kills the local law enforcement, hands the badge to some lolly-gagger and then as he's leaving town he blows it up. Why?

As far as I can figure Jonah is only secured as the hero because he doesn't do things like attack small towns while everyone's in church. Turnbull is blind vengeance, but Hex is Christian vengeance, and somehow that's okay.

Now. The small things.

Two of the scenes opened on really ridiculous shots.

The first of these, the scene after Lilah (Megan Fox) and Hex have been knocking boots all night, opens with her fully clothed and holding herself up over him. This, to me, is awkward since it makes it look like they haven't moved all night.

The second is a scene that starts with Turnbull's henchmen opening a chest and one of them saying "pretty orange balls." Eventually the camera swivels around to reveal a bunch of starless dragon balls, but still. It's a ridiculous line with which to open the scene hinting at what the "nation killer" weapon is.

And, the last of the small things that I'll write about here: Megan Fox can't seem to emote when she's doing her accent. When she does (acting angry with Hex in an early scene) it noticeably falters. Further, her breasts get pushed further and further out of her blouse in each successive scene. I prefer my fanboy pandering to have a little more subtlety.

But - this isn't about tearing bad movies down. There's a whole internet for that. This is about building them back up, or at least coming up with something to recommend them. So, here are a few good things about Jonah Hex.

The music. There's some nicely placed light metal (thanks to Mastadon), a bit of kicking banjo, and, when Hex is about to enter the cemetery at night the music has a brief section that definitely refers to the "Boo House" music from Super Mario World. Listen for yourself:

Jonah Hex Cemetery Music

Super Mario World Boo House Music

Also good: the casting. Josh Brolin really does a good job here (indeed the mark of a good actor, as Joshua Starnes of comingsoon.com points out[link]). John Malkovich does a good job here. Will Arnett is also entertaining, even if his character is forgettably generic.

More good can be found in Jonah Hex's talking with the dead super power. It's a really neat idea since it isn't unlimited. He can't bring people back from the dead permanently. He can still die. That those he revives burn up as their time runs out is awesome, and that dirt revives them is incredibly cool. But the only explanation that we're given of this power is that it is the result of his near death experience at the movie's beginning.

What's more, the idea that the dead can see everyone they knew in life at every and any moment is incredible, but I'm left asking: how does it work? Are they in heaven? hell? Can Jonah revive a good person (in the movie he revives only scoundrels) and will they be helpful? Will they burn up? Maybe these questions are answered in the comic.

Which brings me to my next point.

Does this movie cause the Green Lantern Effect? Does it make me want to learn more about the character and his world? Even go so far as to start reading the comic or a summary thereof somewhere?

No. Not really.

His powers are pretty rad, but that's all I'm interested in based on this movie. The comic seems like it'd be a busty explosion fest. There might be some neat visuals like Jonah exhaling a crow (that was absolutely amazing!) or the one immediately below (homemade screen-cap, all rights to Jonah Hex's creators/producers), but this movie failed to interest me in the mythology or history or background of the characters, plot, and setting.

For more than anything this is because no one learns anything.

By the end of the movie Jonah is still a 19th century "big government" hater and nothing really changes. The twist regarding his best friend Jeb and Quentin Turnbull is a nice one, but hardly worth sitting trough the hour and fifteen minutes that precede it. It complicates the story, sure, but why complicate your story when your main character doesn't even learn from it; the movie ends with Jonah essentially saying - "I'm a killer, always have been, always will be."

Maybe this makes him the perfect symbol of Christian vengeance (having been branded *does* bring the Biblical mark of Cain to mind, too), but it comes nowhere near enough to making him a good character or this a good movie.

But. With that said - I admit that I can see myself playing this movie again for background noise. I'd watch the amazing crow exhaling scene, and revel in the Boo House music, but I'd not give it a captive pair of eyes.

So, Freya, try to take just half of this one up. Oh. And, be sure to get its good side.

[Wōdnes-dæg] Jook - Korean Luxury Porridge?

Hearing about porridge might send people's minds to the food of monks, rural old school farmers, or hermits. But maybe the fault of these foods' reputation should fall on the oats fro which its usually made rather than the porridge itself. Rice porridge is a completely different animal.

Asian rice porridge, jook, is a dish that I first encountered over in South Korea (also known as "congee" on Chinese menus). Making rice porridge is relatively easy. Though where there's less effort there's more time. This is what the recipe (modified from this one) entails.

You'll need five things: 1/3 cup of regular long grain rice, approximately 1 cup of water, 1 tbsp toasted sesame oil, one egg, a small pot. Everything else is up to your own personal taste.

For the jook in the photo below I fried up some mushrooms and sardines, added both shredded ginger and horseradish (on opposing sides), and sprinkled toasted sesame seeds over it. I added some soy sauce to it in the last few spoonfuls, but it made the dish far too salty.

Making jook is just as simple as the necessary items list. Optionally, you can let your rice soak in water for an hour or two before cooking it. If you choose to do so, your rice will cook a little bit faster since it will already be saturated with water.

After you've soaked your rice (if you've done so), toss it into your pot and put it on medium high heat. Add your sesame oil to the rice and mix the two together. Sauté the rice for a few minutes.

Once you're satisfied that the rice is nicely coated in the oil, add the water to the pot and turn the burner up to the max. As the water boils wildly turn the burner down to medium low (3, on a scale of "Warm to 6") and tilt the pot lid so that the smallest crack possible is left.

Let the rice simmer until all visible signs of water are gone (between 30 and 45 minutes). But. Also, stir the rice regularly throughout its simmering. The goal here is to let the water evaporate, while also keeping the rice moist so that by the time most of the water is gone the rice has a paste-like consistency. That might turn your mind back to ideas of porridge and blandness, but bear with me.

When the rice is finished, take your pot from the heat and bring out the egg. Crack that egg, and put the yolk and white into the pot with the rice. Mix thoroughly with a spoon. Make sure that you mix your egg in while your rice is still white hot - the idea is to cook the egg with the heat of the rice, which makes it warm more gradually and all over at once so that it works with the little water left in the pot to give your porridge a creamy base.

Now that the rice is ready, put it into a bowl if that's how you roll, and then add your extras. If you need to cook them, I recommend doing so while the rice is simmering since it's important to have all of the elements of jook together while still hot. And, enjoy!

One last thing to consider is the necessity of toasted sesame oil. This is something that might be hard to find, (I know it is here in Small Town, Ontario) but from my experiments with an alternative, I'm confident that I've come across a substitute. As long as you can get sesame seeds of one stripe or another, anyway.

For the oil used in my last jook I mixed one tablespoon of olive oil and one tablespoon of toasted sesame seeds. In lieu of mortar and pestle, I used the bottom of my spoon to crush as many of the seeds into the oil (or vice versa) as possible. The olive taste of the oil remained, but it was tempered by a mild sesame taste. This came out nicely in cooking, since, even before I added the extra sesame seeds on top, I could make out the sesame flavour in the rice. In the future, however, I will try the same with lighter oils in the hopes that I can get more of the sesame seed sensation into my jook.

Alright. If you have any questions about jook, want to suggest something for this recipe, or just want to drop me a line, toss it in the comments. And stay tuned - I'll be trying to redeem "Jonah Hex" in Friday's entry!

[Moon-dæg] My Gut-Feeling on Teaching ESL in Korea

This is the third entry in my write up on going back to teaching English overseas. The first part gave some hard stats and numbers. The second built on these figures and involved a little bit more information relevant to me. This entry, since this is the entry closest to the full moon, is one that will involve as purely an emotional line of reasoning as I can manage. It may sound oxymoronic (har har), but this is coming right from my gut.

Finances figure largely in this decision of mine. The "start up" costs are pretty much negligible - even if I go over after marrying my fiancée and she comes with. Loans would be needed, but these loans would not linger long enough to stress us out given the kind of cash that we could raise working over there. And who doesn't like making lots of money? This guy definitely does!

But what's my gut feeling about the money I'll make overseas?

I feel really good about it. I mean, I'm not going to be able to go away for five years and then come back a millionaire or anything like that, but that's not what I'm after. Writing can be done while teaching - especially university teaching, since it's not necessarily time consuming (10-20 hours a week, often including prep time). And that means that I could actually be making money while also making a name for myself as a writer.

I've been writing lately (welcome to my blog!), but money making has generally taken a hit as a result. Making money and getting my writing out there, among other writers especially (I have very fond memories of the Seoul Writers Workshop and the Seoul Writers' Collective) and among other people would be awesome. But, then. What's to say that I wouldn't be able to get that kind of flexible employment here in Ontario?

This presents a quandary. But. The plentiful nature of ESL positions overseas is what draws me. And where am I going to find a "city of lights" to quote the Deep Purple song in South-Western Ontario? Granted, they were singing about Tokyo, but Seoul (and even Incheon, my old haunt) are just as bright. So there's still that pull of adventure.

And the fact that I could bring my fiancée with me is icing. Delicious, sweet, strangely nutritious icing.

But then I'd also feel a little bad.

I'd feel that I might be pulling her along with me rather than being joined by her. And I have the sense that as much as she says that she wants to try teaching overseas or to just be with me rather than constantly apart as we've been for the last few months and years before that, she'll be doing something that's outside of her comfort zone.

Stepping outside that zone is a good thing, but then her parents aren't young. Though, her mother is so "Old Country" that with one hand she offers amazing coffee and delicious cooking, but with the other hard criticism and an overbearing opinion. So pulling my fiancée away from that is good - Tauruses within families seem to clash more than cooperate - but it's also bad.

I mean, it's her mom after all. She used to email her nearly everyday when she was in university. They're close. And if something happened while we were away I would carry that with me forever. Not to mention her dad - much cooler, but also just as "Old Country." Though, it's unfair to say that old dogs can't be taught new tricks - years into our relationship they finally let us stay in the same room when I'm over there.

So, having my fiancée with me means that we'd be in for super sexy adventures abroad. But it also means that we'd be away from those close to us. Honestly, though, and this is something that I discovered when I was away the first time, were it not for her I'm not sure that I'd have come back in the first place.

Sure, there was graduate school and friends to come back for, but really, were it not for my fiancée, outside of the temporary situation of grad school, I'd probably have had very few reservations about going back overseas afterwards. I'd still visit regularly (those long summers off (two months once you're a fixture) from university teaching would be excellent for long visits) and I'd have the money to actually *do* things with friends while visiting.

So moral dilemmas aside, I think that there's nothing but benefit for going back from a social perspective. I've lived with my fiancée for a year and we're still together - heck, for a large part of that year we shared a two bedroom basement with another couple. Weathering that took much more than I expect a few years in Korea would.

But then what about the other friends we'd be leaving behind? Skype would work well - it did in my first round - and visits would be possible once we both had more vacation time. Really, I feel that this would be a negligible problem. Some of my collaborative work with friends here, on a fortnightly YouTube skit channel (watch for the first skit this weekend!) and on a Doctor Who podcast, TelosAM, might get more complicated because of the dateline and timezone differences, but co-ordinating schedules is always manageable.

Ultimately, I think that the reason why this is still an option that I'm taking so seriously is that I know that it works. When I was teaching in Korea last I did suffer a little bit of well, not burnout, but I began to feel undervalued by the end.

It was all well and good being a celebrity and probably featuring in one of my young co-teacher's fantasies (she blushingly asked if she could put her arm through the crook of mine when we all posed for a picture on my third to last day), but I was also dogged by the feeling that my students really weren't learning. Maybe that's an argument for not going back - I might just wind up adding to the pile of complaints that some Koreans have about the ineffectuality of foreign teachers.

But this feeling is more likely because of a change to my job description after my first few weeks. What I did in those early days seemed to bore students more than enthuse them. I was totally new to the teaching game then and that my revamped job description dictated that I should make my classes fun rather than purely educational was a welcome break.

But my new m.o. was exactly why I felt as I did near the end of my contract. I wanted to teach my students. I wanted to give them the skills and knowledge necessary to really get English as best as they could. But I had to marry entertainment to education. And my personality made that a little bit difficult to execute.

Nonetheless, going back offers adventure, money, and a chance to actually be self-sufficient. All through my undergraduate years it was almost a bi-monthly occurrence to email my parents and ask them to kick a few bucks my way. But that never happened in Korea. Yes, the three hundred I took as "start up" money quickly ran out and I had to take a small loan from my recruiter to last until the banks opened after my first weekend, but I never had to ask anyone for money after that.

As a student of English who once considered a career in academia, parents and advisors warned me about the dangers of working and making money. And I succumbed to those dangers.

I also know that working overseas is a great way to make lasting friendships. Graduate school certainly was, too. But working in Korea didn't cost me nearly as much. Yet, both have a certain air about them that forges friendships that I can best describe by comparing them to the kind of friendships made amongst soldiers in combat, though I've never been in that line of work.

Honestly, even if I were to stick around Ontario and move to a major city my feeling is that my current friendships would remain and others would spring up anyway. Why not let the others be with people from all the many corners of the world rather than just a few or a couple?

In the end, what I fear the most about going back is that I can't say for sure what my fiancée and I will be getting into. It's one thing if I went over alone and wound up at a crappy school. But I know that potentially bringing my fiancée into the same situation would make me feel directly responsible. I'm sure that she wants to go for her own reasons as well as those involving me, but it does seem to be solely my idea, and so I would feel terrible should anything go wrong for the both of us. If we kept to the public school system, though, that probably wouldn't be a problem. Public schools and big international recruiters (EPIK, GEPIK, JET) tend to be much more legit than many ma and pa out-of-house recruiting agencies.

If you've got any questions or comments about teaching ESL overseas leave them in the comments. And stay-tuned for the last part of this series, coming in next week!

[Freya-dæg] In Time

As far as sci-fi movies go there seems to be few that have a really amazing premise and succeed in carrying it out. Duncan Jones' Moon is definitely a good, recent example of this. In Time could also have been. But as Rotten Tomatoes shows, even audiences (53%), though gentler than critics (37%) weren't incredibly impressed by it.

Let's get right to it. What's bad about this movie?

The concept, that time is now currency and when people run out of time they die, is a great one with awesome potential. But not enough is done with it. There are two or three scenes where the fact that characters only have "x" amount of time left really makes an impact (two of which happen during the chase-heavy last act) but otherwise time could easily be swapped in for money. This is definitely my biggest problem with the picture.

In fact, I feel like I could stop writing here. But, that would be unfair to just how this concept unfurls. Because the thing is, it's not just used for intellectual exercise. Instead it's pretty plainly used as a metaphor for the current financial situation in much of the world.

For example, in one "time zone" (exclusivist areas that have different costs of living to keep those with less time out and those with enough time in) live the elites, a bunch of people who throw decades and centuries around like water balloons on a hot day. These are definitely the minority (or, perhaps, the 1%-ers). The rest of the population of this city (it *is* all set in a single city, I'm pretty sure), is in the rest of the time zones. In true heavy handed fashion, the movie's hero comes from the poorest of these time zones (freely called "the ghetto" by many in the movie).

The hero (Will Salas, played relatively well by Justin Timberlake), seeks to spread the wealth of the few to the many, and more or less succeeds in doing so. By the end of the movie it's pretty clear that the pretense of time has been dropped and money may as well be freely subbed back in, since Salas and the ex-heiress Sylvie Weis (played by Amanda Seyfried) essentially become professional bank robbers. An attempt is made to make the movie more than this throughout, but this attempt is lackluster.

Built into the concept of people living on a set amount of time, is that time can be transferred between people. This transfer is done by clasping forearms while time transfers from one person to another. This is neat, albeit never really explained, and slightly confused in execution. Unfortunately, this confused execution of the transference idea stands as another strike against the "time as money as life-force" concept. Though it also introduces a little game I like to call "Time Chicken."

"Time Chicken" is a lot like arm wrestling, you clasp your opponent's forearm (as if to make a transfer) and then struggle to get your forearm on top of his or hers to drain his or her time away. However, this is where the rules of transferring get murky. In every other instance it looks like the forearm on top transfers time to the one on the bottom, ala an hourglass. But, in a game of "Time Chicken" it seems that the top sucks time up from the bottom.

I call it "Time Chicken" because part of the game's strategy (all of it, maybe) is to wait until your opponent is distracted by your quickly draining clock to turn the tide and put him or her into a state of such a shock that they do nothing until they have lost all of their time.

Salas makes a big deal out of the fact that his dad knew about this "surprise comeback" move, but because time doesn't transfer at lightning speed once you reversed your opponent's fortunes there's nothing but opportunity for him or her to come back and flip you over again. Unless your opponent is so surprised by the fact that you were letting them win that he or she unwittingly sits with slackened jaw until he or she has lost his or her last second. But that seems really unlikely. So, a third strike for concept execution.

Moving on from the concept itself (since it's struck out), the movie's characters aren't much to invest in. Standard poor boy wanting to do what's "right," standard rich girl sick of her protective father and seeking to rebel (or "live," as she says at one point).

There are other characters as well, but Salas' father alone seems like he could have been interesting because he hangs over Salas and Timekeeper Raymond Leon (played by Cillian Murphy) alike. But nothing definitive about the father is ever said and legends appear to have grown up around him months after his death. Legends that leave little about him clear.

At least the characters of the Timekeepers are moderately entertaining.

The idea of Timekeepers, those who make sure that time stays "properly" distributed is a neat and relatively well-executed one. But, again, not enough was done with them - why not have some kind of time-stasis for criminals? Or instead of trying to restrain Salas why not modify his clock so that it's left with five seconds but held in place unless he gets x meters away from Leon?

So much more could have been done with the Timekeepers, but instead they just make financial regulators (what they are in Niccol's metaphor) look cool, even if a little cowardly in the face of the 1%-ers.

But then, what about the good? I might have to dig deep for this one.

Well, there's a pretty tame skinny dipping scene? When Salas beats the ghetto gangster he pulls off some quick, impressive gun work? The guy who plays Philippe Weis (Vincent Kartheiser) kind of looks like Dave Foley from Kids in the Hall?

Really, there's nothing good here that stands up to much scrutiny. I really wanted to like this movie, the preview did it's job excellently when I saw it in the theatre - I was completely roped in by the premise and excited at what Andrew Niccol might do with it. But it fell flat.

So, with a heavy heart, I've got to say, Freya - leave this one where it lay.

[Wōdnes-dæg] Sue, she's Sardine-ian, right?

Something that I miss dearly living in small town Ontario is easy access to decent sushi. To try to work around this lack I've lately taken up making my own. In fact, making it myself is definitely what I've been learning lately.

My ingredients and process are simple, but so far the results have been tasty - if not entirely stable. But I'll get to that later - see the pictures below!

What I've been using for my sushi is Dainty brand "Gem" long-grain rice, a small steel pot, tap water, a carrot, some cucumber/avocado, sardines, mayonnaise, cream cheese, horse radish, and a special sushi rice sauce. What's missing from this list, though, is seaweed.

One thing that I've learned from my attempts to this point is that this wonderful plant pounded into flat sheets is essential for the amateur sushi smith. Without them the rice needs to be moist enough to stick to itself, and the sushi smith needs patience enough to clean that sticky rice from his sushi mat. I have yet to perfect the moisture of my rice, but I have had it moist enough to make a simple roll that looks like this:

So, what's my process?

First, the sushi rice sauce. Find a small container - preferably something that can go onto a stove top burner - and a tablespoon. Pull down some vinegar, sugar, and (sea) salt. Add one tablespoon of vinegar, one teaspoon of sugar, and a pinch of salt into the chosen container. Mix these three together until there are no (or nearly no) sugar/salt crystals left. If your container can go on a burner put it on and put the heat to "Low." The heat will help to melt the sugar and usually creates a much more consistent sauce. It may wind up a little viscous, but that's nothing to worry about.

The rice comes next. Put a 1/3 cup of rice into a small pot. Add enough water to the pot so that the space between the top of the rice (laying flat on the pot's bottom) and the surface of the water is about 1/2 inch. Put the pot on a burner and turn that burner to its highest setting. Watch the rice intently - don't worry, the pot will boil.

Once the pot has either begun to froth up or boil furiously and loudly turn the heat down to "Low" or a setting of "1." If you feel it necessary, tip the pot lid slightly to provide space for the steam to escape through. Wait 15 minutes.

At this point open up the pot and check for any visible water. If there's none then pull the pot off the stove and set it aside to cool. Otherwise, put the lid back on and let the rice steam for another minute or two. Pots with clear lids are excellent for this, since, even if obscured by steam and loose foam, it's usually easier to see through them to the rice within than other, more opaque pot lids.

Add the sushi rice sauce to the rice while it is still hot. Fluff the rice so that the sauce gets spread evenly throughout it.

While the rice is cooling grab the mayonnaise (or sour cream if you want more richness and less tang) and cream cheese. Find a container (maybe the same used for the sauce). Mix the two in a ratio of 1 part mayonnaise to 2 parts cream cheese in your container. Once your mix has a generally smooth consistency it's ready.

The rice might still be cooling, so use this time to chop up your vegetables. Cut them into long, thin slices. Carrots should be cut into two inch pieces and then in half them lengthwise and cut the halves into strips.

Cucumbers should first be cut width wise (cutting off the ends is alright) and then stood up on their newly flattened ends. In this position, make vertical cuts down the length of the cucumber. Follow these cuts with horizontal ones in the same fashion.

If you're fortunate enough to have an avocado that you want to use then open it up, remove the pit, and slice the halves lengthwise. Pull out the glorious richness with a spoon and keep it at the ready.

By now the rice ought to have cooled. So throw down your sushi mat and then lay a bed of rice upon it. Leave a border of about an inch all around this bed.

Before going any further, double check that your mat will roll up and away from you. It's tragic to have loaded your roll only to find that you'll be rolling against your sushi fillings. Once you've made sure that your mat will roll up and away from you, spread your mayo/cream cheese mix onto one half of the bed. Spread horseradish over the mix. Finally, lay down your vegetables and fish so that their length runs from left to right.

Add some sesame seeds if you like.

Then, mustering all of the hope in your ability that you can, roll the bottom of your mat forward. Hold it there. And, while keeping the bottom in place, roll the top of your mat down so that you drive the top wave of rice over and onto the bottom. Use your mat to press the two sides of your roll together. And - release.

If you can, transfer your roll to a plate before cutting it into smaller pieces. Doing so will leave your mat clear of much of the rice debris and thus easier to clean.

Pour some soy sauce into a wee bowl if that's your thing, and, enjoy! It might fall apart in transit to the plate, or if left for too long, but you just made yourself a pseudo-sushi roll! Indeed, this is a tasty - and continuous - lesson!

Do you have your own experiences making a favourite food not easily found where you live? Or maybe just a recipes or food idea that you want to share? Any good or groan worthy sushi-related puns? Feel free to carry on a discussion in the comments.